1. Field of the Invention
The invention is related to the field of fluid injector valves, and, in particular, to small size, high speed, electrically actuated fluid injector valves for inejecting fuel into internal combustion engines.
2. Prior Art
The current trend in automotive fuel control systems is to electronically compute the fuel requirements of the internal combustion engine and provide the determined quantity of fuel to the engine through electrically actuated fuel injector valves. There is a concerted effort by the automotive industry to upgrade the performance capabilities of these injector valves, improve their reliability and reduce their costs. Currently, the fuel injector valves used in the automotive industry are labor intensive requiring a relatively large number of machined parts having close tolerances and require complex assembly and calibration procedures.
This problem was initially addressed in my co-pending patent application Ser. No. 535,009 filed Sept. 23, 1983, now U.S. Pat. No. 4,552,371, issued Nov. 12, 1985, entitled "A Low Cost Unitized Fuel Injection System". This patent application discloses an injector valve having a conical valve seat engaged by a stem valve and specifically designed to reduce the number of machined parts.
The present invention is a miniature fluid injector valve designed to further reduce the number of parts and to eliminate to a maximum extent the number of parts having to be machined to close tolerances. The resultant fluid injector is not only easier to assemble and calibrate, but also has superior operating characteristics.